Domestic Disturbance (12. selected cinemas)
Lumbering along
Mark Steyn
Aside from the $20 million β or is it $25 million now? β he gets per picture, it's hard to see why John Travolta bothered with his post-Pulp Fiction comeback. Come to that, it's hard to see why he's still getting $25 million per β or is it $30 million? No other mainstream movie star stars in so
many awful mainstream movies. Sometimes they're spectacular failures β like last year's Swordfish. Sometimes they're unobtrusive failures β like Domestic Disturbance, which sailed in and out of American movie houses in a couple of weeks last November. Compared to both films, the talking-dog picture was a work of genius. Given what we know about the great Scientologist and gourmand's insistence on working 'with' the writers and director in sculpting his character, it seems only fair Travolta should get his share of the blame for these duds, The only puzzle is why anybody keeps casting him.
In this movie, casting is everything. Travolta plays Frank Morrison, whose wife Susan has divorced him and is now about to marry Rick Barnes, played by Vince Vaughan. As the Chicago Sun-Tirnes's Roger Ebert noted, Travolta plays nice better than anyone else and Vaughan plays creeps better than anyone else (see the Pry c ho remake). So the only reason for casting so predictably is if you were going to play against our expectations, like Hitchcock originally planned to do in Suspicion, getting Cary Grant to murder Joan Fontaine. Indeed, the film's early scenes lay on the naughty'n'nice clichΓ©s so thoroughly one assumes the old switcheroo can't be far behind: Rick (Vaughan) is a wealthy investor new to town, which in Hollywood terms is like wandering around with a neon
sign on your head flashing 'Serial Killer', Frank (Travolta), on the other hand, builds boats β lovingly hand-crafted old-fashioned wooden boats. That's Hollywood shorthand for: honest. Works with lumber and routers and varnish, not a lot of flickering dollar-signs on computer screens. The Travolta boat bits are almost fetishistic: one watches with awe as one watches him with an oar. Alas, even in the small aquatic vessels market, most folks want the lightweight fibreglass, but Frank says he just can't give up on the old ways: he prefers things to be wooden. In that case, he's come to the right movie. Dialogue, characters, plot, all are lovingly crafted from premium lumber.
Travolta has become the world's master at exquisitely detailed portrayals of characters of no dramatic interest whatsoever. So the scene where Frank and his 12-year-old boy share cheeseburgers and iced-tea is like a beautiful, lavish public service announcement for responsible divorced parenthood. But you know Travolta takes himself so seriously that he'd never attempt such pitch-perfect rapport if it weren't for real, and so around about this time it slowly dawns that Domestic Disturbance is a thriller with absolutely no thrills. Frank carries on being decent: he goes to his exwife's wedding, and behaves jolly sportingly. And Rick carries on being shady, and just to confirm things his best pal shows up on the big day, and he's played by sleazy Steve Buscemi! Steve Buscemi unshaven, in absurd aviator shades and hideous jacket, picking at his stained teeth! Steve Buscemi disappointed to find the quaint little coastal town hasn't got a porno bookstore! Steve Buscemi making cracks to Frank about how his exmust know some really hot tricks under the sheets to have ensnared an old hound like Rick ...
Hmm. Maybe Susan (Teri Polo) doesn't know her new husband as well as she thinks ...
Before you know it, there's a murder, and the only witness to it is the boy, Danny. But Danny has a record of lying to folks, and people figure it's something to do with not handling his parents' divorce too well, and so nobody listens to him. In accordance with the conventions of the genre, the local police are especially dismissive. Vince Vaughn does a lot of creeping up on Danny, suddenly looming over him as he's brushing his teeth, etc. If you haven't yet been to a panto this season, Domestic Disturbance provides many excellent opportunities to shout, 'He's behind you!'
Only one man believes Danny, and that is, of course, Frank. And so the stage is set for a showdown between Dad and his usurper, a showdown that, like almost everything else, defies dramatic logic and even elementary continuity. How on earth did Harold Becker, director of Sea of Love, wind up trying to float this leaky boat? Here yet again is a production-line Hollywood product that only reveals what an unreliable production line Hollywood is: maybe someone ought to put some thought into developing the cinematic equivalent of the fibreglass boat; it's better than sinking with a stellar lardass like Travolta.
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